Synthstatic

Alison; 2003

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At least Skywave are honest. One need only take a cursory glance at the Fredericksburg, Virginia-based trio's latest album, Synthstatic, and its hallucinogenic pink and blue artwork, or pull up the band's website at killerrockandroll.com to infer what their music sounds like and where they get their kicks. Like many of the best rock bands around today, Skywave have hardly an original lick in them. But anyone who listens to The Strokes for their inventiveness or risk-taking is missing the point. Synthstatic is indebted to two bands in particular-- My Bloody Valentine and The Jesus & Mary Chain-- and Skywave aren't afraid to filch textbook riffs and techniques from either group. The 14 songs here are shamelessly and often overwhelmingly derivative, and dare you to do something about it.

Of course, what Synthstatic lacks in originality it makes up for in songwriting formidability: Paul Baker (guitars), Oliver Ackerman (bass), and John Fedowitz (drums) are equally adroit composers who manage to maintain stylistic consistency throughout this album. Even the harshest, most grating guitars on "Wear This Dress" fail to suppress an irrepressible melody that recalls The Wedding Present, and interestingly, owes more to jangle-pop than shoegaze. "Nothing Left to Say", Synthstatic's longest track, relaxes upon a quavering repetition of zonked-out, detuned guitars to deliver the album's most touching moment. This atonal dirge, in particular, is indebted to Loveless' grimy ballads, imbued with just enough moments of unmitigated beauty to sustain its six downtempo minutes. Opening track "Tsunami", meanwhile, lives up to its title with monstrous walls of washed-out guitars and driving, machine-like drums.

Duly impressive is the shear magnitude of Skywave's sound. At live shows, the band is known for soundchecking at half-volume, then cranking it all the way up at curtain time for an unsuspecting soundman. Bassist Oliver Ackerman designs his own effects pedals, including the Supersonic Fuzz Gun and a series called Total Sonic Annihilations, which Skywave employ to help achieve their massive sound. His clientele includes Keith Fullerton Whitman, who used FX-pedal-augmented, laptop-produced guitar tones to construct 2002's beautiful Playthroughs. Synthstatic is similarly experimental in its delicate treatment of extreme noise, and its oscillating high-volume dynamics more than live up to the band's promising URL. The record even sounds potent on laptop speakers.

If only for its formalism is it impossible to call Synthstatic a great album. Bands following similar formulas in different genres might be pilloried, and Skywave will doubtless endure their own share of derision. But some forms of rock, given an occasional tightening of the bolts, never seem to grow stale. Had it been released 15 years ago, a work of this songwriting caliber would likely have been wildly acclaimed. As it is, Synthstatic lacks any shred of originality, but is probably the best of all possible end-results from a monument built completely out of scrap material, a shoegazing "Junkyard Workshop" that, like any successful tribute, enforces the significance of its forebears while managing to hold its own ground.